India adds 8.77 mln mobile users in Jan -regulator

NEW DELHI, Feb 23 (Reuters) - Indian mobile phone firms signed up a record number of 8.77 million new subscribers in January, data from the telecoms regulator showed.

In December, new wireless subscribers numbered 8.17 million.

India's mobile firms have been signing about 8 million users each month since July, lured by call rates as low as 1 U.S. cent a minute and by cheap handsets.

Still, only about a quarter of the population has a phone, and the government has a target of 500 million phones by 2010.

Although the total wireless subscribers in India surged 55 percent to 242.4 million in January from year-ago levels, the fixed-line telephone subscriber base continued to contract as more users shift to mobile phones, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India's data showed.

The total of wireline subscribers in January shrank to 39.2 million from 40.4 million year ago.

Sector leader Bharti Airtel Ltd (BRTI.BO) added 2.3 million new mobile phone users in January, taking its subscribers to 57.4 million.

Second-ranked Reliance Communications Ltd (RLCM.BO) added 1.6 million users, lifting its subscriber numbers to 42.6 million, and Vodafone-controlled (VOD.L) Vodafone Essar Ltd signed up 1.3 million users to take its customer base to 41.2 million.

Including fixed-line phones, India had 281.6 million telephone users by the end of January, taking the percentage of its population with access to telephones to 24.63 percent as against 23.89 percent in December, the regulator said. (Reporting by Rakesh Sharma, editing by Anthony Barker)